Reflection
by Scirocco
Summary: I reposted it under In the Forests of the Night.. PG cuz it's disturbing...
1. My life comes to an end right about........

Hunger, intense hunger. Not for food, no, but for the blood of the humans surrounding me. This has to be some insane dream, some figment of my imagination gone wild. I can't have been turned into what I think I have been. It would be too awful to face. But each day, when I look into the full-length mirror hanging on my wall, my reflection is just a little bit more faded than the previous day. It is only a tiny bit every day, but it still makes me think about my time as a human. How when I look in the mirror, I should be able to see a bright, detailed image of myself. How my life once was, and how it is now. How I've been turned into a vampire. I know it sounds unreal to you, but it is true. Those of you who don't believe are the next victims on the lists of the great vampires. And that can never be good. I'm sure whoever is reading this is another unbeliever, but by the end of my story your thoughts might change. I, too, was once a normal boy is the midst of the great war going on around me. It was a quite famous quarrel around here. Not really a quarrel or a war, though. More like a neighborly feud. My family, the Smiths (quite the common name, as you might have realized) and our interestingly strange neighbors, the Mepirvas (an extremely odd name, fitting the family perfectly). Not many people in town favored the Mepirvas over us in this "war". Those who did were as strange as the Mepirvas themselves. They were strange in a very different way, and no one could pinpoint the exact reason for their weirdness. The most recent fight was over the most prized possession in our family, a large egg, made of solid gold. We had returned home from church one day and found the mantle where it usually stood bare. Automatically, we assumed it was the Mepirvas. Since I was the baby of the family, and at the age of 13, still quite small, my father bid me to sneak into the Mepirva's house and steal something valuable of theirs. (My father often said, "Don't get mad, get even." Yes, once again, it's common, but we're common people. Does that make us any less human? Well actually...that will come later.) While looking around in their basement, I spotted two large freezers full of God knows what. Since they were locked, I figured they kept some kind of valuable food product inside. Perfect. I was a master at picking locks by now; I'd had so much practice. It took me about thirty seconds to open the simple padlocks on the doors. As soon as I opened the doors to those freezers, I knew these odd people from next door weren't just strange. They were vampires. I grabbed two full bottles of what I believed to be blood and ran out of there as fast as I could. When I showed my father what I brought home, I was spanked, hard, and sent to my room. Grounded. Two weeks. DAMN! But I knew I had to get back to that house. So I did. And apparently, at the wrong time. When I got to the basement, the Mepirvas(I later found out that if you move the letters of Mepirvas around you get vampire) were what appeared to be feeding. On the floor were two little children, obviously tricked into coming here with some vague offer for candy or a present. Yeah, the present of becoming one of _them. _I had not told my father I had left the house (duh!) and since they had seen me come in, I looked like I had no choice but to become one of them. One of the vampires. I had no chance against these monsters. Even though they had a massive body size that could crush me in a second, vampires usually used their minds to weaken you first. And that's when it happened. That's when I came into this world. Thirty years ago I was alive and well. Thirty years ago I was a human, just like some of you, with a great future ahead of me. Thirty years ago I had my reflection was clear. Now it's gone. So all of you must appreciate the life that you lead, even if you don't turn out as good as you expected. At least you're not a vampire. At least you have a reflection. 


	2. Marie

I look in the mirror and let out a scream of disgust. There's nothing there. Just a faint vision of what I think I used to look like. I used to have the bluest of blue eyes, blue as the summer sky. And my hair was long, and almost white, from so many hours in the sun. My tan skin, my long, thin face. I was of small stature, smaller than most boys of my age. Once in very good shape, and extremely thin, I am now just...there, shapeless. My skin is pale, and all the color has left my eyes. My hair is now almost black and short from catching on one too many fangs. I haven't grown an inch, which comes in handy when you're a vampire, and for some reason, I'm much more apt to be out in the night rather than the day. I'm much more capable of reading expressions now, while when I was human I was quite gullible. I have lost my sense of fun, and my friends are few. I had a great girlfriend back 50 years ago, when I was still 'alive.' I often wonder what became of her after I left their world. I don't believe I will be able to find someone to love here, all the girls are fighters. It's just not the same.

Then I see her again. Not just the most beautiful vampire in our world, but the strongest, smartest, and most powerful. Marie. How I long to be close to Marie, next to her, anywhere. I am always following her and trying to figure out her daily routine. I think that tonight at the club, Red Fire, I'll try to talk to her, dance with her, something. My dream is that she will say yes. She reminds me of my girlfriend back 50 years ago. Now that I think about it, her name was Marie also. 

Inside Red Fire, the red strobe lights are flashing black shadows on the walls. And I saw Marie. Dressed in a short, black, glittering skirt and a tight red shirt that stood out among the crowd, everyone was staring, boys and girls alike. How could I have a chance with such a beautiful girl like her? What are the odds? Since I was 13 years old when I died, I didn't have much experience with girls. I was too caught up in the "feud." The only girl I ever had was Marie, the real Marie, the one who's probably sitting at home with her grandkids, eating cookies and reading stories. But all I have now is this Marie. Dark, mysterious Marie. Somehow she reminds me of my Marie, back where I used to call home. Both girls, being tall, skinny, brunettes, were wanted by many. I got one, why not the other? 

I knew that was impossible. Or at least I thought it was until she came over to me, said hello, bought me a drink. I thought maybe she had the wrong person mistook me for someone else. She thought differently. Marie went on to tell me about her life when she was human. She was the same age as me when she died, even lived in the same town. And I realized that this WAS my Marie. Reunited at last. We spent the night dancing, singing, just being us, like we used to be. My sense of fun was slowly returning. My supposed "everlasting loneliness and unhappiness" curse drifted farther away. Now with Marie here, being a vampire isn't so bad as it was before. Not even my reflection bothers me...


	3. Spiderwebs

Being a vampire is like being a fly trapped in a room of spider webs; one wrong move and you're gone. So what you're already dead? The pain of death isn't even close to the pain of not being able to feed for a time. Withdrawal is worse than if you were to be coming off heroin. Excruciating pain splits through you're head and your stomach. It's like your insides are being shrunk to the size of someone's thumb. It makes you weaker mentally too, so that the others can tell you won't be able to defeat them. And it's not like you can just run to McDonald's and grab a burger or something. Blood is all your body wants, needs, craves. There is nothing else. 

As you get stronger, there are less and less spider webs to deal with. I would have been classified as one of the stronger vampires, if not for Marie. She used me as a way to get food, a way to get even more powerful. Then she left me to rot. This is what being a vampire does to your heart. Turns it to stone. Now I am known as weak, it is known that anyone here can easily break me. But that will change. I will get my reputation back, and I will avenge Marie. I will seek her out, follow her. Whatever she seems to think will be her food will then be mine. She will wither away and I, once again, will be the stronger of the two of us. She deserves that, the little bitch she is. I loved Marie, and she knew that, but she used that knowledge to take advantage of a food opportunity. That's how it is here. No feelings whatsoever, except for greed, and hate. No blood, no power, no respect. And everyone wants to be respected. I'm slowly destroying some of the webs in my life, little by little. As webs disintegrate, I become stronger, every day. And, every day, I am one step closer to Marie. One step closer. I will get my revenge. 

The day has arrived. I am strong enough now, I've built up over the past two years. She has been beaten thrice in the last month, and I will strike while she's weak. I creep up behind her, she's oblivious to the fact that I am there. I raise my hand, about to strike a blow to her head. It stops in midair. I can't bring myself to do this. For such a long time I have seeked revenge on this greedy bitch they call Marie. How am I not able to hit her, just once? Why?, you ask. I still love her, that's why. It's disgusting when I think about it, but it's true. And I was thinking about how I must go back to all those spider webs, and back to hating my reflection, when she said, "I thought so."


End file.
